By Balachander Suriyanarayanan: Subscribe to Balachander's RSS feed
July 26, 2010 1:29 PM EDT
The European Commission announced on Monday that it has decided to initiate formal antitrust investigations against IBM Corp. in two cases of suspected abuse of its position on the mainframe computer market.
The first case follows complaints by emulator software vendors T3 and Turbo Hercules, and involves IBM's alleged tying of mainframe hardware to its mainframe operating system.
"IBM is alleged to have engaged in illegal tying of its mainframe hardware products to its dominant mainframe operating system," the regulator said. The complaints contend that the tying shuts out providers of emulation technology which could enable the users to run critical applications on non-IBM hardware.
The second case involves IBM's alleged discriminatory behavior towards competing suppliers of mainframe maintenance services.
“The Commission has concerns that IBM may have engaged in anti-competitive practices with a view to foreclosing the market for maintenance services, in particular by restricting or delaying access to spare parts for which IBM is the only source,” the commission said.
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In 2009, about 8.5 billion euros worldwide and 3 billion euros in the European Economic Area were spent on new mainframe hardware and operating systems, the EU said in a statement on Monday.
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